


Maybe, Maybe Not

by glacis



Category: X-Men (Movieverse)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-31
Updated: 2010-01-31
Packaged: 2017-10-06 21:38:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/58010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glacis/pseuds/glacis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two stories:  Maybe - Maybe she made her choice.  Maybe they were all they had left.  Reaction story from the movie X Men United. Maybe Not - One year later.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Maybe, Maybe Not

_Maybe_

It started out as a perfectly normal day.  Then a mutant tried to kill the president.  Then Wolverine came back.

Scott wasn't sure which was worse.

Jean looked altogether too happy to see the prodigal.  Scott watched them flirt, his impulse to stake his claim on Jean tempered somewhat by the fact that they'd gotten married a few months before, so his mind told him he didn't have anything to prove.

His gut didn't know whether he was jealous that Logan was hitting on Jean again, or jealous that it was Jean Logan was hitting on instead of himself.

Wasn't the first time Logan had gotten Scott confused over his sexuality.  Probably wouldn't be the last.  But Jean was Scott's, and Scott was Jean's, and that was... good.  Safe.  Right.  All the things it should be.  He loved her with all his heart.

He'd do his best to ignore the fact that other parts of his anatomy were a heck of a lot more interested in Logan than they had any right to be.

Happily, he had a mission, of a sort, taking Charles off for his monthly chess game dash bonding session with Magneto.  As far as Scott was concerned Magneto could rot, but Charles shared an emotional tie with Magneto that Scott didn't want to examine too closely.

It reminded him a little too much of himself and Wolverine.  Not what he wanted to think about, when all he could see when he looked at his wife and the other man was how both of them would look naked.

Even more happily, Jean also had a mission, with Storm, so he wouldn't have to leave her alone with Logan.  It wasn't that he didn't trust his wife.  He did.  Completely.

But if Scott found Logan close to irresistible while at the same time wanting to punch his lights out, he knew what kind of temptation it would be for Jean, who had all the attraction without the urge to smack him.  And the best way to avoid temptation, Scott discovered a long time ago, was to run the other direction as fast as possible.

He was still distracted by thoughts of Logan, and Jean, together, individually, and his own conflicted feelings about Logan, or he might have noticed sooner that something was wrong with Charles.  As it was, he was caught off-guard by the ambush.  Managed to get a few blasts off, but not nearly enough to get through to Charles, trapped in the plastic prison with Magneto, nor to stop the mutant with what felt like metal fists who brought him down.  The last thing he felt before the lights went out was an explosion of pain in his head.

When he woke up, he was strapped face down on a table, and a man he'd never seen before was dripping acid on the back of his neck.

The next thirty hours or so were a nightmare.  He was trapped in his own mind, able to see and hear and touch but with no control at all over his actions.  The man with the stubble and the glasses and the hatred flaring in his eyes eventually unstrapped him from the table, sent him out to look for his friends, and told him to kill them.

The only one he found was Jean.

He did his best to kill her.

Thank god her best was better than his.

The battle was fierce, and painful, and rocked the cement walls around them, sending cracks through the foundations of the dam and rupturing equipment everywhere the fire exploded.  He sent every ounce of power he could from his eyes at his wife and she held it off, penned it in, threw it back at him.

By the time it was over, whatever his captor had done to him had worn off, and Scott was able to hold Jean, and comfort her, and tell her he was sorry.  They had no time, there were too many demands on them... find the children, rescue Charles, stop the mental attacks with the copycat Cerebro, get the hell out of there before they all drowned as the dam tore itself apart, trying to get the jet up in the air...

The next few moments were crystal clear in his memory.  He was fighting the controls of the jet, Storm working frantically beside him, when Jean disappeared.

Down to the flood plain.  He tried to reach her.  She threw the ramp up, blocking him, trapping him in the jet.  He fought to get to her, screamed at them not to leave her, heard her voice coming from Charles and tried to reason with her.

He failed.

The jet rose, under her will.  They survived, by her sacrifice.  She died.

Her choice.

The last vivid impression he had wasn't of Jean.  It was of Wolverine, holding him in place as he fought to get past, fought to get to her.  As he realized he'd lost her, and felt an answering shudder run through Logan's body.  As the denial, and the shock, and the grief set in.

Before he clamped down on it, ignored the tears in Storm's eyes and the pain in Charles', lurched into the pilot's seat and took them to Washington, DC.  Emotional meltdown had to be put on hold.  They had a mission to complete.  They had to make sure Stryker's insanity wouldn't continue after his death.  Had to get to the President and stop the war before it exploded completely out of control.  Had to be strong for the children, and wait until he got home before he fell apart.

In their bedroom.  Their empty bedroom, where everywhere he looked he saw Jean.

Less than fifteen minutes after he walked in he walked out again.  He wandered the halls of the school, taking in the damage the military had wreaked when they'd invaded, distracted himself with details until his brain was overloaded.  It didn't help.  By all rights he should be exhausted.  From the ambush at the prison to the hell at the dam, he'd had the crap beaten out of him.  But instead, he was wired.

Of course he ended up in the Danger Room.  It wouldn't take much of a workout to wear him out completely, and maybe then he could get some rest.  Stop thinking for a little while.

Stop seeing Jean die.  Stop thinking he could have, should have done more to stop her.

Of course, when he got there, Wolverine was already there.  Blood dripped from wounds that closed almost as soon as they were inflicted.  Sweat ran down his skin, his claws flashed, his face twisted in a snarl as he fought phantom enemies.  Scott leaned against the doorjamb, arms crossed over his chest, and watched him for a long time before Logan turned to him.

They stared at one another.  Scott recognized the anger, the helplessness, the loss in Logan's eyes.  Too strong to be hidden by a snarl, no matter how fierce.  Scott felt his own lips twist into a grimace, and launched himself into the fight without another thought.

Logan welcomed him with a swipe to the jaw and a kick to the ribs.

Scott gave him back a forearm to the throat and punch to the kidneys.  To his surprise, Logan actually winced.

Then he counterattacked even harder.

The next half hour was the most intense hand-to-hand combat Scott had engaged in for months.  It felt good, getting the shit kicked out of him, kicking the shit out of Logan, until Scott finally took an uppercut to the chest that knocked him flat on his back, and he realized he couldn't stand up.  It took everything he had just to breathe.

Logan stood over him for a few moments, fists clenched, ready for more, until he took a closer look and saw Scott was done.  He hovered there uncertainly for a second, then extended his hand.

Scott took it.

Yanked hard, and pulled Logan down beside him.  Then started laughing at the shocked expression on Logan's face.

And couldn't stop.

Tears leaked out from beneath his visor.  Logan had a hand on his shoulder and was shaking him, but it didn't do any good.  Scott laughed harder.  Logan growled, "Shit!" and back-handed him hard enough to rattle his visor.

Scott kept laughing, even as he gasped for breath, lying there, unable to do a damned thing to stop.

Logan's hands were warm against Scott's face as he cupped both cheeks between his palms.  Then he leaned in, staring hard at Scott.  He was a fuzzy blob of red-tinted hair and narrowed eyes and down-turned mouth through the tears swimming in Scott's eyes.  Logan muttered "shit" again, leaned down, and kissed him.

It was an effective way to stop hysterics, Scott decided, although it was the first time he'd ever actually been hysterical, and hadn't ever thought about it before.  Maybe that was why, when Logan tried to draw away, Scott pulled him back down and bit Logan's bottom lip.

Which Logan took as an invitation to put his tongue in Scott's mouth, and abruptly, shockingly, Scott could feel again.  Not the ache and the beat of denial against his skull that had been driving him insane earlier, but something much more primitive, something that had nothing to do with reality, with life, with death, with Jean, with who Scott was with Jean, with who Scott would never be again.

Maybe it was crazy.  At the moment, it felt like the only sane thing to do.  So Scott went with it.

And maybe Logan was just as crazy, because after the first attempt to withdraw, he didn't try to stop it again.  Instead, he licked Scott's mouth and bit Scott's neck and used his claws to shred Scott's clothes.  Then he rubbed his face against Scott's skin, and Scott buried his hands in Logan's thick hair, and if he was still crying, neither one of them cared.

Logan's hands were strong on him, lifting and twisting and moving him, so different from Jean's gentle touch.  His mouth was wide and hungry, pulling the response from Scott, body heavy against him, rough tenderness unlike anything Scott had ever felt, and exactly what he needed.  The first time Scott came it was in Logan's mouth, those long arms stretched the length of his back, holding him down and close at the same time, his legs over Logan's shoulders.  The second time he came he was on his belly, Logan crouched over him, a blanket of heat all along his back and down between his legs, centering on the strong movement inside him, the mouth biting his shoulder, the hands covering his own, holding them flat against the floor.

He fell asleep that way.  Logan curled around him, still inside him, still moving, barely rocking but solid and real and completely unlike reality.  So different than anything he'd ever had with Jean.  When he woke up in the pre-dawn hours the next morning, Logan was still wrapped around him.  Still holding him together, keeping him from falling apart.

Scott didn't know if he appreciated or hated Logan for that.  He did know he needed it.  Maybe always would.  He wasn't sure there was anything else.  Not anymore.

He turned in Logan's arms and kissed him, once, firmly.  Logan kissed him back, then woke up completely, and gave him an appraising look.  Scott shook his head, not wanting to say anything, pretty sure anything he said would be wrong, and not willing to give up the only comfort he had.  Logan closed his eyes, gave either a grin or a grimace, Scott couldn't tell, and rested his forehead against Scott's.

"Sleep," he whispered.

The next time Scott opened his eyes it was daylight, and Logan was gone.  A pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt were folded in a pile next to him, and he was tucked up in a comforter.  Moving stiffly, he dressed, made his way to his room and took a long hot shower.

Beneath the spray, he closed his eyes and cried.  By the time he'd dried off and dressed, visor in place, there were no tears left.

He made his way to Charles' study.  They had a lot of work to do, and right now, that was the only thing Scott would allow himself to think about.  At least, that was his intent.  Reality, as usual, turned out to be something different.  He wouldn't let himself think about Logan.  He couldn't help but think about Jean.

Maybe it was shock.  Maybe he was just numb.  Maybe it was denial.

She'd made her choice, that's what Charles told him.  Hell, that was even what Logan told him.

Maybe she had.

Maybe she'd been wrong.

Maybe there was no maybe about it.

Scott stared blindly out at the ruby-tinted landscape, the voices of the children through the door as they tramped through the hall on their way to class.  Charles said it was important to get back to normality as soon as possible, to minimize the trauma and restore a sense of stability to their lives.

Normal.

Nothing was normal any more.

He heard the distinctive rustle of Logan's jacket, smelled the mix of leather, cigar smoke and sweat, felt the ambient temperature rise in the room from the heat Logan gave off.  Scott took a deep breath.  Felt the tremble deep in his bones start up again, not that it had ever really stopped, except for the few hours last night when Logan had followed him down to the Danger Room.  Fought him until he dropped.  Held him together.

Again.

"You okay?"

Scott knew from the tone of his voice that Logan knew how stupid the question was even as he asked it, but he appreciated the sentiment behind the unanswerable question.  Answered it the only way he could.

"Yeah."  With a lie.  "Thanks."  And the truth.  "You?"

"Yeah," Logan lied in return.

Scott stood there and listened to the hitch in Logan's breath as he walked over, felt the heat as Logan's hand brushed the back of his neck, rested on Logan's strength as he had ever since she'd made her choice.

Tasted tears on Logan's mouth.

Stole some of that heat to warm the emptiness inside him.  It wouldn't last.  But for now, it would do.

He broke the kiss, resting his head against Logan's shoulder for a moment before straightening up and stepping away.  They stood, close but not touching, for a long moment, before the door opened and Charles rolled in.  Logan tensed and prowled to the other side of the room, and Scott went back to staring out the window.

The wheelchair hummed as Charles moved close to Scott, staring up at him somberly.  Scott felt his teeth clench, and forced out, "We should have tried harder to save her."

"There was nothing we could have done, Scott," Charles repeated gently, as he had often over the past day and night.  "She made her choice."

Scott turned and walked out the door.  He wasn't surprised when Logan followed.

"Hey."

Scott paused, glancing back at him.  There was a vulnerability in Logan's expression Scott wasn't used to seeing.  He swallowed hard.  Logan's eyes softened.  "She did make a choice, ya know," he said.  "She chose you."

No, Scott silently disagreed, she didn't.  She didn't choose either of us.  She left us both.

To each other.

_Maybe Not_

Walking through the halls, hearing the cheerful voices of the children and the lower, calmer voices of the adults, one would never know that only a year ago the school had been a shell, wrecked with bullet marks and shattered glass and splintered wood.

And blood.

Mustn’t forget the blood.

On this bright Spring morning the polished floors and polished paneling gleamed, the windows sparkled, the paint was crisp and fresh on the walls.  The shadow of their past could still be seen in the haunted eyes of the children, but then most of them had been hunted long before they came to the school.  The most recent attack might have hit hardest because it came to them in a place of safety, invaded their haven, and left them frightened, off-balance for months.  For the most part they were back to normal, though.  Kids were resilient.

Scott wasn’t so sure about the adults.  Knew for a fact he wasn’t normal, even what passed for normal for him.  The days were a parody of normalcy with great gaping blank spaces in them.  The nights…

The nights were his own haven.  His own form of unreality.  The only thing that got him through the hell of his days with any balance at all.

Logan was a more integral part of the school than Scott ever thought he’d be.  Much more integral part of his life than Scott ever expected.  At times that realization still shocked him.

Not when he woke up in the morning with Logan’s arms wrapped around him, a leg tossed over his hips, bristly face buried in the back of Scott’s neck.  Not even when he walked into his room, saw the bed where Jean should be still sitting there empty, and turned away to go to Logan’s bed.  Every night, through the quiet corridors.  Every night, for a year.

No, the shock came in the middle of the night, when Scott reached out, and found broad shoulders and heavy muscles and the smell of leather instead of soft skin and softer hair and the scent of irises clinging to the sheets.  Scott would freeze, Logan would twitch and settle around him, gathering him up and holding him close.  Until the warmth Logan threw off thawed Scott out again, and he remembered where he was, and why.

In the morning, Logan would look at him, and Scott would kiss him, and they wouldn’t say a word.

Charles knew, of course.  Charles knew everything that happened in that house.  He didn’t mention it, but he told Scott it would be all right.  There was a knowledge in Charles’ eyes that Scott didn’t share, and he didn’t ask.  Maybe Charles was right.

Maybe not.

The older kids still looked at him with pity in their eyes, particularly Bobby and Marie.  Scott had to force himself to stay open, not clam up and shut them out.  Hard work, but worth it, as the two youngest members of the X Men were turning out to be a great advantage to the team.  The younger kids didn’t really understand, and treated him exactly as they had before, and that was the only other thing keeping him close to sane.

Scott made it through his classes that day, wondering if somehow his students could see it.  A brand of black across his soul.  A year to the day, and Storm had wanted a memorial, but Scott thought that was morbid.

His grief was his own.  Theirs, they could share, if they wanted.  No one could have his.  No one could understand it.

Except Logan.

So when they gathered in the garden after dinner, and the clouds rolled in, and the temperature dropped, and Kurt muttered prayers under his breath while Charles spoke poetry, Scott very quietly walked away.

Walked back into the mansion.  Went to their bedroom, packed his clothes and his spare visor and his shaving kit, walked out of their bedroom.  Closed the door.  Narrowed the beam from his eyes to a fine laser, and melted the lock.

Logan was waiting for him.  Scott leaned his duffel bag against the wall and looked at him.  Bright blue eyes stared at and through him, then Logan strode forward.  Picked up the bag, tossed it into the corner on the far side of the bed, then reached over and wrapped his hand around the back of Scott’s neck.

Like fire against his skin.  The imprint of those long fingers pulling him close, the burn of coarse hair against his cheek, the softness of the lips opening his own.  All things Scott associated with Logan, and only Logan; all things that scrubbed the pain and the past away until there was only the heat and the present.

Scott’s hands buried themselves in Logan’s hair, as he returned the kiss and took it a step further, angling his head until the gentleness gave way to fierce hunger.  Logan growled, deep in his throat, and Scott moaned in response as he felt his shirt give way under Logan’s hands.  Friction burned at the side of his neck as the material was ripped away.

He moaned again as Logan’s tongue left his mouth to travel along his jaw to sooth the reddened skin.  Scott tried to return the favor but his hands were shaking too badly to catch hold of Logan’s shirt.  Teeth sank into the muscle at the juncture of his shoulder and neck, and Scott whimpered.

“Fuck,” Logan muttered against his skin, “so fuckin’ good,” as he unbuckled Scott’s belt, lowered the zip on the fine woolen trousers, “love the way you taste,” as his hands shoved Scott’s boxers down his thighs, leaving skin bare to the cool air and the heat of his mouth.  Down over Scott’s shoulder, rubbing his whiskers against Scott’s chest until the skin was flushed and reddened.  Stopping for a little while to nip the line of muscle, the softer flesh of nipple, to pull at the fine hair, and all Scott could do was bunch his hands in Logan’s shirt and hang on.

Every day he chose his armor, his button-down shirts and heavy cardigans and visor, the shell that covered what was left of the man.  Only with Logan did that shell ever crack; only with Logan did Scott let himself bleed out from the mask of Cyclops.  So strange, that only with Logan did Scott allow himself to be himself.

There was power in being half naked, his shirt hanging in shreds baring his chest, his pants and shorts pooling around his feet, as Logan mapped and marked him, still fully dressed, the rasp of denim and brush of cotton as erotic as the bruising hands and the biting teeth.  There was power in surrender, a power he didn’t dare touch outside this room.  He only trusted Logan with this.  Maybe this is what Jean intended when she left them to one another.

Maybe not.

But it was what he had, and it was more than he’d ever expected to have, when he lost everything.

Just as Logan had.

Scott’s breath hitched and he choked, trying to say yes, trying not to scream as he came in Logan’s mouth, bucked against Logan’s hand, fingers buried inside him, as his knees gave out.  Logan caught him, as Logan always did, and Scott tugged Logan’s head up until they could kiss.

He tasted like salt.  Like Scott, and like tears.  He always did.  A constant in an insane world.

He lifted Scott to the bed, still half-tangled in the remnants of his clothing, not bothering to strip him off the rest of the way.  Without a sound he climbed up behind Scott, turning him onto his side, rubbing his hand from Scott’s shoulder to his hip.  Logan needed this, Scott knew, as much as Scott did.  A year ago Scott had lost his anchor, his best friend, his love.

Logan lost his hope.  And Logan hadn’t had much to begin with.  Yet another thing they now shared.

Heat licked along Scott’s spine as Logan curled behind him, shifting his left leg forward until Logan could push inside.  Relaxed from orgasm and emotional exhaustion, Scott lay there and let him, hands limp on the covers, face turned into the pillow.  He breathed in as Logan withdrew, exhaled as Logan thrust in, the rhythm echoing his heart rate.  Slowly, then faster, and harder, and deeper, until Logan made a noise like a dying man and shoved hard into Scott.

Liquid heat within him, matching the solid heat around him.  Harsh panting breath against his back, arms oddly gentle around his chest, heavy body a welcome blanket of warmth seeping into Scott.  He hadn’t gotten hard again as Logan fucked him, not completely, but his nerves were singing and he wasn’t finished yet.

Lifting Logan’s hand to his face, Scott rubbed the back against his cheek, fingers weaving together.  This wasn’t something they’d done, and perhaps this would be the line Logan wouldn’t cross, but Scott needed this.  Touch, connection, not the usual suck and fuck and hold him together as he fell apart that they’d been doing all year.

Scott shifted until Logan’s softened cock slipped from him, then slowly turned in Logan’s arms.  He took his time, giving Logan every chance to say no, every opportunity to shut him down and turn away.

He didn’t.

He lay quiescent, eyes tracking Scott’s movements with the innate wariness of a wild animal tempered by the unexpected gentleness he usually only showed to the children.

And to Scott.

But only in bed.

At the first brush of Scott’s hand against his cheek, Logan shivered.  “Cyke?”  He sounded uncertain.  Scott smiled.  “You’re not… there’s no light comin’ out of your visor.  You okay?”

Scott’s smile muted.  “Maybe not,” he admitted.  He traced the line of springy hair up to Logan’s temple, then back down again, fingertips mapping out the wide brow, the arch of bone and softness of lid, the flutter of lashes.  A stroke down the length of nose to the dip above the upper lip, then along the slope to the corner of his mouth, around the curve of chin and up the jawbone to end where he began.

“Whatcha doin’?” Logan asked tentatively.

“Looking at you,” Scott answered very softly.  Beneath his fingertips he felt a dimple appear beside Logan’s mouth.

“Guess ya don’t need these then, eh?”

A hand rose and an instant later his visor was gone.  A clunk of metal on wood told him Logan had put it on the side table, in easy reach.  It was Scott’s turn to freeze.

“It’s okay, kid,” Logan told him, calloused fingers raising to cup Scott’s chin in turn, before Scott felt a kiss whispered over each closed eyelid.  “I trust ya.”

And he did.  That was one of the miracles of the last year.

That, and the fact that Scott had survived it.

As had Logan.

Swallowing hard, Scott leaned forward, nuzzling the side of Logan’s neck, then running both hands through the thick hair covering the banded muscles on the wide chest beneath him.  He took his time exploring, learning Logan in a way he’d never done in all the time they’d taken together.  Fingertips discovered the depth of softness to skin that couldn’t scar, the tensile strength of muscles over adamantium over bone, the burning heat of him that Scott soaked up like a man dying of cold.

Not so far from the truth, really.

Scott worked his way down tensed arms to splayed hands, fingers ghosting over the long line under the skin that would be claws when extended.  Logan’s skin shuddered under his touch but he didn’t flinch.  Didn’t tell him to stop.

His self-control was incredible.  Scott envied him that.  He didn’t envy the years of torture, the barely broken wall separating Logan from his memories, the anger that simmered just under the surface, or the pain… he had enough pain of his own, and his strength wasn’t the kind Logan embodied.  But he envied the way Logan kept it tied down, used it to fuel him without letting it destroy him.

Scott had a feeling if he ever gave his own anger full rein, it would tear him to pieces.  So he channeled it into the moment, the way Jean had taught him, using his body as his eyes and letting his emotions flow out of him.  Replacing the loss and the heartache and the endless mental circles with the immediate sensation of hair-roughened skin on sturdy thighs, the roundness of a knee and the hard edge of shin, the arch of foot and the ropy muscle of a calf beneath his hands.

Logan was panting again, hard again, hands fisted in the sheets and claws snicking out an inch into the mattress and retracting again, like some sort of huge jungle cat kneading the linens.  Scott wandered back up Logan’s body as slowly as he’d moved down, until he stopped, straddling Logan’s hips, hands sweeping along Logan’s collarbones, until his thumbs met in the indentation at the base of Logan’s throat.

The pulse beat strongly there, thundering under his hand.  Scott leaned down and kissed Logan, lips exploring as hands had, mapping the drawn-together brows, the lips pulled back in a grimace, the sweat beading under his jaw.

Reaching behind him with one hand, Scott caught Logan’s cock and steadied it.  A startled “Son of a bitch!” broke from Logan as Scott sat back on him, breaking the kiss to arch back and sink all the way down with one long smooth stroke.  Scott tried to laugh, but didn’t have the breath.

Instead, he moaned, nestling his ass into the cradle of Logan’s groin, until the stretch eased and left only the heat behind.  Then he rocked, up a few inches, down all the way, up again, and down, setting a rhythm that left them both hungry.  Logan was whimpering now, another new development, and Scott decided he liked it.

Dropping one hand to his own erection, the other down to roam over Logan’s chest, pinching a nipple, tugging at fur, stroking the heaving line of ribs as Logan gasped for breathe, Scott stroked himself in time with every shifting movement.  Too soon, it wasn’t enough, had to move faster.  Had to stroke harder, had to hold on tighter.  Found himself slamming his body against Logan’s, fucking himself deeper and deeper, until nothing existed but the heat and the darkness and the pain and the sweat and the mind-blowing pleasure surging through his body.

“Fuck!” Logan snarled, spitting it between clenched teeth until it barely sounded like a word, and Scott pushed down as hard as he could as Logan bucked beneath him, nearly throwing him off.

The combination of strength and helplessness, the feel of Logan trembling beneath him, the swelling cock inside him and the scalding heat dripping back out of him undid Scott.  His hand clenched around his cock and he spasmed, humping into his hand, back down on Logan, milking the last of the sensation from them both.

All the tension drained from him, his muscles giving out, as Scott collapsed atop Logan, burying his face against Logan’s neck, arms falling limply around the broad, shaking shoulders.  He heard a nearly-silent snick as the claws retracted then Logan’s arms wrapped around him.  Holding him close.  Nuzzling his hair.  Keeping his together.

He felt Logan relax beneath him, and moments later heard a soft snore.  He couldn’t help but smile, and if there was more contentment than sadness in it for once, he didn’t notice.  The only thing he knew was for once, he didn’t feel like he had the weight of the world on his heart.  Scott inhaled deeply, sweat and musk and Logan surrounding him, as he drifted off to sleep.

He’d thought his life had ended a year ago that day.

Maybe not.

END


End file.
